Preparation...I've Moved Up a Stage

Bring it you delightful confection...I'm ready.



I'm going to need some moral support here people! Let me hear it!

How to Know if You Live in the Ghetto

~Jon, dear, don't read this post. You are an excellent provider & never think otherwise~

Go outside, take a look around, and marvel at your neighborhood. One day, you are living in a perfectly nice, working class suburb. The neighbors know each other, their kids play together in the street...then, one day something happens. Any number of bad things can happen, too many to list in fact. The point is, at some point or another, the quaint working-class neighborhood you used to live in has morphed into ghetto. Some of us don't realize that, in fact, that our place has become a ghetto. Aside from the obvious signs, like old ladies selling cocaine in your driveway on Wednesday afternoons, there are some other key signs that you do, in fact, live in the ghetto. Please allow me to list a few just so you are aware.

You May Live in the Ghetto If...

1. Nothing in your house is mounted or held in place properly. Any repairs made to property by your landlord are shoddy at best.
2. It doesn't matter what day is trash day, because your neighbors will pile massive amounts crap in your yard regardless.



"I have been sitting here almost a week."

3.) The city doesn't bother to repair any property damage they do to the lot because they figure, "Meh, we're in a bad side of town anyway. Why bother?"

4.) You have a house that is literally falling in on itself next door.

5.)   Illegal Immigrants come with baskets to collect fruit that grows in the yard of the condemned house.

      

6.) Even the mailbox tries to steal your shit.

7.)    You wake every morning to a combination of train horns and N.W.A. blaring from cars driving by.

8.)    Girl Scouts don't try to sell you cookies, Jehovah's Witnesses won't pass out "TheWatchtower", and you will see no Mormons on bikes trying to spread the word about the Latter Day Saints.

9.)    You've had a random child knock on your door at 3 a.m. on the coldest night of the year looking for his mother, and you had to call Child Protective Services. (true story)

10.)  The last unit in your complex is rented by a single, teenage mother. How do I know she's single?

11.)   When you leave a half decent pair of shoes or furniture outside for trash day, it mysteriously disappears before the trash man arrives.
12.)   Your friends are afraid to come over after dark.
13.)   Your parents think you should wait on having kids until the "schools in the area are better" or you have "a bit more space."


There are many more reasons. I simply can't list them all. However, this should be enough to give you a basic understanding and let you know if your living in a dump. I have composed a little song about our first little apartment together. I would sing it for you, but I would sound like William Hung. Therefore, I will simply give you the lyrics, plus the original tune that the lyrics were adapted from. Click the link to see the original music video, and get a hint of the melody if you have never heard it. Enjoy.

"All Things Considered"

Original Song by: Yankee Grey

Adapted Lyrics by: Me

All things considered we’re doin' just fine even though

We have debt the size of Texas at our baaaaank
The way I feel I should be losing my mind
But all things considered
We’re doin' just fine

Woke up this morning to the sound of fights outside our door
We got served a piece of paper for breakfast that said
“Pay right now or you don't live here no more”
And the stray dog won't let me pet him, he just drags
my trash out in the street
And the train made me late again
We should have just stayed in bed asleep

All things considered we’re doin' just fine even though
We have debt the size of Texas at our baaaank
The way I feel I should be losing my mind
But all things considered
We’re doin' just fine

Well the A.C. broke down again right before the city cut off the gas
And the hoodlum kid’s words are ringing in my head
“One more new thing and I’m robbin’ your...” yeah
Well I can’t wait till five o clock when I drive my beater back towards the house
So I can sit in traffic all day
And end up going to the ghetto!

All things considered we’re doin' just fine even though
We have debt the size of Texas at our baaaaank
The way I feel I should be losing my mind
But all things considered
We’re doin' just fine



As Promised...Wordless (or Near Wordless) Wednesday 2 weeks worth!

Why "fat is fat" is not an accurate statement.

 

"Easy Crock Pot Potato Soup"= raw potatos + a layer of milk+ a layer of butter fat floating and 4 hours of wasted time waiting for a meal.

 Die soup die!

Dessert 2: Banana Cake "Bomb" and Other Firey Disasters

Jon’s parents are on weird diets which are high protein and very low carb. Not that Atkin’s nonsense, this was actually derived from a cardiologist at John Hopkins I believe. I don’t know when the event took place, but it appears Jon’s mother threw out any kitchen implements that would lead to the easy preparation of baked goods (i.e. cake pans). I had to scrounge around the back their pantry until I found (quite luckily I might add) 2 of those small disposable, aluminum cake pans.

You know the great thing about using someone else’s kitchen is that you get to use the gadgets they have that you do not. Gadgets like electric mixers, large shiny bowls, and a convection oven. Well, as great as it all is, you still long for some of your own tools. In this case, more than one spatula. How does a person operate with only 1 spatula in the kitchen? I will never know. But I digress.

I start whipping this bad boy up and it calls for, get this, 6 mashed bananas. Thank God the woman had jumbo bowls because my batter quadrupled in size and weight. The electric mixer said “screw this” and the blades would not even turn. I had to stir it by hand.

As I am mixing, I get a call on my cell:

“Come eat lunch with us, we are taking a quick break from the store.” It’s Jon. He’s headed to the BBQ joint near the store and about 10 blocks from the house.

“I can’t I am elbow deep in cake, I have to get it in the oven.”

“How much longer will it take?”

“The recipe says 45 minutes, but I don’t even have it in the pan yet.”

“Just come on. Don’t worry about it.”

“I can’t just ‘come on’. Ask your mom if cake batter can rest.”

-Pause-

“She says it can’t, it has to be made right away.”

*Sigh*

Side Note Here: Jon’s parents and I have very distinct philosophical differences in regards to fire safety. I was taught to never leave an unattended candle burning, never walk away from the kitchen when you’re cooking, and always unplug appliances not in use. His parents routinely leave a prayer candle burning in their house, and a fire in the fireplace to keep the place warm when they head to the store in the morning. EEK!

Back to the story:
“I can’t make it. Just bring me something later,” I tell Jon.

“Oh come on, get it in the oven and you will make back in time before it is done,” he assures me.

*My eyes glaze over* I can see the headlines now: “Disgruntled Girlfriend Torches Future In-laws House Due to Delays in Wedding Proposal.” I see his parent’s house engulfed in flames with fiery bananas exploded against the wall like ignited napalm.

Against every fiber of my safety being I acquiesce. I pour the batter into the pan…and notice that we have a problem. The batter is filling the pan up way faster than it is emptying out of the bowl. Shit! :-O

A logical person would have stopped pouring and tried to save the rest of the batter for a smaller side cake. Not me, I can make it fit! Well all the batter fits, to the rim of the pan. I know this is not going to end pretty.

I try to lift the pan to get it into the 350* oven. It almost buckles under its banana sodden goodness. Crap! I slide a cookie sheet underneath the pan to catch the inevitable overflow and support its girth.

I send a text and smash banana into the crevices of my cell: “On my way.” Guess what happened.

Kaboom!

Dessert 1: Lemon Jelly Roll

Jon’s mother has made 2 of these unsuccessfully this week. Don’t get me wrong, they were eaten right away, but they didn’t come out the way that was intended by the recipe. She gave me a couple of warnings and then I went to work.

The recipe calls for you to make a thin cake dough that you cook until it is “just done” then to “at once” spread a jelly topping on the de-panned, "just barely done" cake.

My feeling about the recipe at this point has already gone sour. Julie Powell, author of “Julie & Julia” writes about this exact feeling in her new book “Cleaving: A Story of Marriage, Meat, and Obsession:”

“Heat the oil until almost smoking. (Don’t you just hate it when recipes say things like “almost smoking”?) Reminds me of that Beckett story about a stage direction reading that a door should be “imperceptibly ajar.” Fuck you, Beckett. The oil can be smoking a little. Or not. Just make sure it’s good and hot.” (p. 38).

So that is how I feel about this recipe. To make matters worse, this old world cookbook gives no indication of how long it will take until the cake is “just done.” When the time comes to bake this portion of the recipe, I have to stop what I am doing (cooking a bean stew for 6, and prepping for the other two cakes to be made) to stand watch.

But first, the jelly for the roll has to be made. This is contrary to the recipe, but never having made a jelly, and only slightly experienced in a jelly like pie (lemon meringue), I didn’t want to be still fussing over it when the “at once” moment came along. So I beat 3 egg yolks, add the lemon juice, corn starch, etc. and begin to slowly bring it to a boil on the stove.

What you need to know about concoctions like these is this: there comes a critical moment where all of a sudden they gel. If you aren’t hovering over it constantly stirring, it is going to burn. Ruined. In the trash, can’t be saved.

I am whipping this stuff around trying to get the cornstarch to dissolve. Powered mix-ins are to me how jellied items are to Julie Powell: they just don’t jive for us. I can never get the little clusters of powder to break up and mix with their ingredient brethren. They just make their way into the final product all lumpy and disgusting. That is why I am whipping this bad boy like my life depended on it.

So when the jelly gels, FINALLY, I get the 12x14” baking sheet greased and floured. I pour out the cake batter, but it does not coat the whole bottom of the pan. Crap! I spread it using gravity like 99% of the rest of the population. Into the oven, and onto the floor where I sit and watch for that "just done" moment.

You know those time lapsed commercials where the little cookie in the oven suddenly pops up and looks ready to eat? Well the cake did that…sort of. I took this to mean that it was “just done.”

At this point you are supposed to flop it on a towel and shemear on the jelly. Well, I carefully loosen all the edges as the “at once” window is quickly closing. I want it to come out of the pan seamlessly, but it holds on for dear life! I turn over the pan against the towel and begin to pound on it, hoping to shake the cake loose.

No dice.

Scrape, scrape, scrape, pound, pound, pound.

Repeat 3 times.

Finally, I get a BEAUTIFUL full side to fall off the pan in a nice sheet. I gently dangle it inches above the towel and throw out my back. It is falling out of the pan painstakingly slow, then the worst happens: a stick and tear. I get this huge tear in the cake, and 1/4 of  it is stuck to the pan while the rest flops on to the towel. Shit!

You know how you can sometimes make a hot cookie or brownie kind of mold back together with some mashing? Not going to happen with a jelly roll cake. It wants to be its own man. Therefore, I am forced to try to scrape the rest of the cake off  the pan, and try to glue it together with the lemon jelly.A nice coat of jelly over the top disguises all ugliness.

Now it's time for the rolling up part.

By now I am sure that “at once” window is long gone and is moonlighting somewhere in Albuquerque. I start to roll anyway, but the freaking cake has now embedded itself in the towel. I finesse it away from the towel and try to roll.

Roll, roll, roll.

*Tear*

Shit!

Roll, roll, roll.

*Tear*

Shit!

Finally I decide to quit being dainty and say (all together now) "The hell with it!"

I finish rolling the cake up and notice that it is nice and fat at one end, while looking deflated and sad at the other.

With a shrug of the shoulders, I sprinkle on powdered sugar. Jon’s parents have low culinary expectations anyway.

All I want for Christmas is a Clean Kitchen

Christmas if flying up on me and for all of the one of you that have been keeping up, I have done a bazillion cooking jobs for parties. Well, after having a vomitous maximus stomach virus, I decided to sanitize everything in the house. I MUST CLEAN ALL THE THINGS!

This brings me to the fact that I HATE dishes. Dirty dishes are gross. So gross in fact, that even though I am over the vomiting phase of this disease, I might have catastrophic vomit relapse because of having to do these dishes. Currently, I am stuck with a counter-full of dishes and only me to do them.

One of these days my children will be dish washing masters...

*vom*

No Help From Others and Other Failed Missions

For awhile now, I have been trying to get Jon's grandmother to teach me what I am doing all wrong when it comes to making kolaches.

She seriously laughed out loud when she found out I was stirring everything by hand. "Use a mixer!" Okay, Grandma H, I'll do that.

Grandma H lives about 2 hours away. She says, "Call me when you want to learn." Well I have called, and called, and called. "Now's not a good time" is always her answer. There is never a good time. I swear his family has something against me.

"She has to prepare for it," Jon informs me, "She makes like 12 dozen at a time. It takes a lot of mental preparation, plus she has to go to the store."

I offered to buy everything in advance and bring it the 200 miles so that she doesn't have to go out. No luck.

"THE HELL WITH IT times two!!!!!!!

I decide to take another stab at it on my own. I gave the stand mixer a whirl, and I think I burned up the motor. The kolache dough climbed the mixing blades, embedding itself in the machine's plastic casing.

I guess I will have to register for a new one if Jon and I ever get engaged.